


Salt

by Amythe3lder



Series: Irregular Pieces [5]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Depression, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/F, Femslash February, Mental Health Issues, Past Sherlock Holmes/Victor Trevor, Victor Trevor is Sally Donovan's brother, parasuicidal behavior, salthea - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-22
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-05-22 17:16:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6087934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amythe3lder/pseuds/Amythe3lder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She would have liked to claim that she didn’t know why she’d done it.<br/></p>
<p>Sally and Anthea: enemies, friends, lovers. Not necessarily in that order.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Walls

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sanguisuga](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanguisuga/gifts).



> This does a bob-and-weave through both the show and my own work. For that, I apologize.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She would have liked to claim that she didn’t know why she’d done it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a little pre-series.
> 
> But I have learned to leave no stone unturned  
> And keep the wall against my back  
> And the love is real as the day is long  
> And the night is black  
> "Chrome Plated Heart"- Melissa Etheridge

The first time, Sally Donovan wasn’t sure what was happening until it was happening with a force that left no room for doubt.

She’d seen the other woman before, of course she had, standing polished and sleek and uninterested beside Sherlock’s older brother. Whenever the brunette passed across her field of vision, she tensed. To be fair, Anthea- or whatever her name was- had been perfectly civil through all of their encounters. Somehow, that more than anything earned Sally’s ire. It was too easy to wind most people up; she had the notion that with someone so self-contained, the payoff would be more satisfying.

She was right.

Anthea had come into the Yard alone this time, and Sally cornered her in a disused back corridor. “Headed for Lestrade's office? ‘Cause he’s not there. Think you know that, though.”

Anthea eyed her, and Sally was gratified to see the calculations in her bland smile shift from map coordinates and estimated arrival times to attack strategies and extraction plans. It was so nice to be recognised as a threat, even if she didn't mean any harm. She just, “Wanted to tell you to stop getting my boss looped up in your boss’s trouble.”

“What makes you think my boss has trouble?”

“He’s got Sherlock for a brother.”

“It's all in hand,” her opponent replied, but Sally could smell the smoke. She couldn't resist another prod. She stepped closer.

“Yeah, I've seen how good you lot are at keeping him right.”

Anthea’s lips thinned and she shifted her gaze, shifted her weight, and said, “I suppose you think you have reason to be concerned.”

Sally did have reason. She honestly did. Her natural suspicion had served her well in her career, and if it closed her off from opportunities to… well, be close to people, she’d seen too much of what sort of shit befell the unwary. Lived a bit of it, even, before she could help it. If the other option was believing everyone was acting to the benefit of all involved, she'd happily stay isolated. Especially from _that_ one.

At the moment though, she was caught up in chasing that temper she knew was on the edge of boiling over. “Lestrade's got enough to break his heart on without Mycroft Holmes worrying him over some little lord’s drug binges.”

“You assume that's all Mister Holmes wants with him? Another pair of eyes?” Anthea changed her stance and was suddenly very close, and Sally felt her pulse speed up, ready for a blow. The air felt electric. She was panting lightly into the narrow space between their mouths, but Anthea was still tightly coiled and growing stiffer by the second. _Almost, very nearly there_.

“I don't really give a damn what it's all for, I doubt anything good can come of such an association,” she hissed, and she sighted the glimmer of firelight in Anthea’s eyes as the other woman brought her face still nearer.

“Really, and what the fuck do you mean by that?” Anthea spat, finally breaking, and Sally leaned in and kissed her.

She would have liked to claim that she didn’t know why she’d done it. While she could say that it had never occurred to her until the moment she was sliding the tip of her tongue between the other woman's warm lips, she knew exactly why.

Anthea didn’t seem surprised in the least, and the idea that her own actions might have been part of someone else's plan only spurred Sally on. Sally threw herself into it, kissed like she was afraid of losing ground, teeth clacking and sweat breaking out on her neck and between her breasts. She tasted salt and vinegar on Anthea’s tongue and the thought of this lady eating anything so pedestrian as fish and chips made her laugh and push Anthea against the wall. Her advantage was temporary. Anthea roughly spun them, rolling their bodies until Sally could feel the cool wall through the back of her blouse, bruising the skin over the edges of her shoulder blades. Heat shot to her core. She rocked her hips forward and met with Anthea’s almost instantly. They both gasped. Nobody's point that round.

Anthea fought for control and had to keep fighting, soft noises echoing off the narrow walls in the dim hall. She pulled back, flush-faced and wild eyed, to suck at Sally’s bottom lip as she ground them together. Sally’s head spun in pleasure so fierce it was almost violent.

When one of Sally’s hands slid up her back into her hair to cradle her head, Anthea jerked back, out of reach and gone before Sally could blink, before she could register the pain in her lip and tongue at it, tasting copper now to mix with the salt and vinegar that stung the nip.

She slumped back, propping herself on weak knees, and wondered who had won.

*          *          *

Anthea focused on the click of her heels carrying her away from Lestrade's office, let the steady power in the sound take her mind. In a state of mild shock, she'd got straight to business as a default course of action, on autopilot as she deftly picked the lock and made the drop: Sherlock’s latest drug test, proving him fit for duty.

Before the... _confrontation_ a few moments ago, she had been thinking of stopping at a café for a post-mission latte, but she’d nixed that on further consideration. She had tarried long enough and it was best that she get back to the office right away. Holmes was always out of sorts immediately following lunch; he would benefit from a well-placed nudge. Today, this minute, she felt especially eager to start a debate with her charge. There was coffee in the staff room, after all. Her decision had nothing to do with wanting to hold on to the hinted flavours of bitter green tea and mei fun at the borders of her awareness, more memory now than truth, like the ghost of long fingers up the back of her neck.

She got outside before she started shaking, and for the second time, she found herself with her spine to the bricks, trying to iron out the wrinkles in her breathing pattern as the adrenaline wore off and her stomach churned. She waited for the car to come around, waited for the rain to fall so she would have an excuse for the shivers. She was just jittery from the work- a first, to be sure, but not completely beyond plausibility. Holmes would never buy it, but he was too respectful- or discreet, in contrast to his brother’s myopia- to mention it if her all-day lipstain was a bit smudged or faded or if she was disheveled in ways that had nothing to do with her appearance.

She wished she hadn’t kissed Sally back. She wished she hadn’t stopped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rating is anticipatory, btw.  
> Thanks to Sanguisuga for assuring me that this doesn't suck. <3 Thank you, bat-friend.


	2. Desks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It had been nothing but an impulse in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is set sometime in that golden age between the end of s1 and the start of s2 when everyone was mostly okay.
> 
> My friend implores me  
> "For one time only  
> Make an exception"  
> I am not worried  
> "Anna Begins"-Counting Crows

For a score of months, they didn’t touch or speak. They had a perfect rhythm of existing in the same sphere and never making eye contact, synchronised to only glance when the other looked away, to breathe in while the other exhaled.

Once John Watson settled into the flat on Baker Street, there were fewer Sherlock-related incidents that called for his older brother stepping out of the shadows to intervene, and Sally knew Lestrade sat a little easier behind his desk knowing it could be cluttered less with unsolved cases and more with empty coffee cups and doodles. And if Sherlock’s short leash meant she rarely had run-ins with a certain understudy to the national peace, well good. That was fine. It had been nothing but an impulse in the first place.

It wasn’t as though Sally lacked for companionship. She could go to any restaurant, pub, or chip stand in Greater London and take her pick, and from time to time, she did. It would never be serious with any of them, but that wasn’t what she was after anyway. Relationships took work, and Sally was already employed. What could possibly come from staying late on a Friday night to finish paperwork and moon over some secret-keeper in a pencil skirt?

 _Probably nothing_ , she thought, rifling through her takeaway tikka masala for a prawn and wiping a drop of sauce off a manilla folder.

It wasn’t what it looked like. She wasn’t pining away a year after a kiss, like some Brontë sister pinup girl. She just wondered- private-like- what might have happened if Anthea hadn’t bolted. Would the embrace have run its course and ended anyway, temporary madness sparked by tongues carved out of flint and steel? Or would they have found an unassigned corner and dared each other to say when, to cry uncle? Would she have learned how deep down that fire was buried? Would they be together right now?

It was exactly what it looked like.

It was lining up to be a rough weekend. She had the thing tomorrow evening, and _herself_ was bound to be there, since it was another side project from Sherlock’s brother. She was more than a bit sceptical that the elder Holmes knew who was meant to be owing favours, here, but Greg seemed fine with it. Oddly fine, really, considering how good he was at staying afloat by not claiming every case in sight.

 _Maybe not quite so odd_ , she thought, recalling the way her boss all but twitched his whiskers when Mycroft came around. She couldn't see the appeal, but she’d known the Holmes brothers under different circumstances and was too smart to put her back to either of them. Not again, anyway.

When he’d come to politely demand their involvement in this latest pending disaster, Mycroft had asked how her little brother was faring. Like he didn’t know. Like he cared.

“Not as well as yours,” she’d sniped, and felt satisfied at the way he rocked back, then greasy at what followed.

“Ah,” was all he said, and it was sympathy, a gentle apology, and totally inadequate in every way that counted. Still.

She didn’t know who to blame for Victor anymore.

*          *          *

Anthea put on expressions like layers of cosmetics, as effective as glamour charms in fairy stories and twice as likely to baffle her enemies. The only person she couldn’t fool was on her side, using similar tactics. They both loathed these functions, and a hefty number of the people who attended them. Even the colour of her gown had been chosen because dark blue inspired trust from others. Sometimes she wondered if Mycroft remembered what it was like to smile and mean it. She didn’t think she did.

Her current funk was rooted in a phone call from her mother that had held her up from starting the shower until she’d finally put the call on speaker and got in to shout over the sound of the water. The conversation had put her off her food until after lunch. As the middle child in a family of five, Anthea was used to being called every name that wasn’t hers, but her mum’s dottiness was resolving into something with a diagnosis at the end. Added to that, the topic had been her dad's newly broken arm. Even though her parents hadn't shared a room since Nicholas had moved out- the first of them to leave bare rectangular spots on walls that looked suddenly dingy in his absence- Anthea had sort of assumed that they would always be willing and able to look after one another. Now she was left facing the day when that no longer held true, and she felt guilty that a tiny part of her worry was spent wondering how long she had before her own youth ran out, and whether anyone would notice if she starting speaking fuzzy and forgetting words in her old age, and who would tend to her when doing the mundane resulted in fractured bones.

It wasn’t helping that Sally Donovan was casing the room from the wall by the _hors d’ouvrés_ table, looking smart as hell in a formal ladies suit: dress slacks cut loose enough to pass as a slinky skirt and a low cut blouse that showed off her unadorned neck and freckled collarbones to distraction.

 _Focus_.

Mycroft had begun the evening by pretending that he had no clue why she and Sally were avoiding each other and had thereby confirmed that he knew what had happened between them before, and that it bothered him. She wasn’t sure why, but she could guess.

Now, though, he was intently staring at nothing at all, and as she watched, he tapped his thumb to his forefinger: _look here_. Anthea followed where he pointed that finger a moment later.

Mycroft called his shots in the most literal way. “Floral arrangement in the corner pocket,” he muttered, sounding equal parts bored and amused. Through a series of queries and instructions disguised as more inane commentary, the small problem was recovered from “a vase of oleander, was that arrogance or accident?” Mycroft wondered aloud. The suspect was apprehended leaving through the kitchens and frogmarched out the back and into a car, to be later branded a “perpe _traitor_ ” in Lestrade’s emailed report.

Anthea watched the guests and staff mill about unaware of the danger that had been averted and marveled again that so few could be privy to so much. She found Sally looking at her from across the room, and flushed when the sergeant held her gaze and started towards her. Sally had done herself credit tonight, figuring out who was responsible for the intercepted intelligence and snaring them quietly with no input and no instruction.

Breathy and still glowing with exertion and utterly gorgeous, Sally asked, “Did you see,” then tacked a bit more on to the end, “...where Lestrade skittered off to?” She winced slightly at her lame save.

Anthea wanted to kiss her on the grounds that Sally was eager to show off, because she was embarrassed for it, and because Anthea _had_ seen. It was probably a personal failing that, with a national crisis unfolding, she’d been drawn to the bounce of Sally’s confident walk and the fall of her hair as she expertly handled the villain and passed them off to the waiting backup. Now with the action cooling on the rack, Anthea had no real reason to look anywhere else, and frankly couldn’t bring herself to try.

She answered, letting suggestion soak her tone, “He’s off someplace dark, letting Holmes- how did you put it?- get him into trouble.” Sally raised her eyebrows and Anthea asked, “Didn't you know?”

“‘Course _I_ knew there was something there, but I didn't think _they_ did.”

Anthea snorted, “They don't.” Both men seemed content to deny that strings had got attached. Between Mycroft manufacturing reasons to disappear on nights Greg Lestrade was sleeping alone, and the wistful tells she had glimpsed when they’d consulted with Molly Hooper on collecting dead bodies for the now-defunct Bond Air, Anthea could only conclude that her charge was a bit doltish about matters of the heart.

Before she could phrase the observation, Sally Donovan was fixing her with a determined stare and suggesting that they follow the example. “Just this once,” she clarified.

“Of course. You were good tonight, but you’d have to impress me to warrant a repeat,” Anthea replied, bone dry and feeling brittle. She swallowed around the offer for more in her throat.

 _Maybe_ , Anthea thought as she silently shadowed Sally upstairs, _I have more in common with Mycroft than I thought_.

The room looked to be someone’s study, too few books to be a library and too many for an office. There was a sturdy desk on the opposite wall and a hideously upholstered couch adjacent. Anthea made the first move this time, no need for hesitation when she was already gasping for this touch.

Their lips met, and for an immeasurable time that was all she could think of, cool lips, warm tongue, hot breath behind her ear when she trailed across her jawline to kiss Sally’s neck. “Tickles,” Sally huffed.

“Good or bad?” Anthea asked. She added pressure on the assumption that tickling was always horrible.

“Tolerable, before.” The hands on her back gripped tightly, just to the left of unpleasant. She hadn’t been complaining, then.

She lightened up and moved down. “Better?”

“Hm.”

She paused at the edge of Sally’s blouse and brought her fingers to the first button, waited. Sally hummed again, pitch trailing up, demanding, while she tugged the zip down Anthea’s spine without unhooking the top first, fingers sliding into the gap, rubbing firmly. _Perfect_ , Anthea thought. She thought it again a moment later, when she had Sally’s bra off and her peach-colored blouse dangling from the waistband it was tucked into. Anthea was still wearing most of her gown. It was a point in her favour.

She used the advantage to cement her lead by taking one peaked breast into her mouth, swirling her tongue around Sally’s nipple as lightly as she could. Sally moaned at that, and the sound shot straight to Anthea’s core.

Sally pulled her up and backed her to the desk, kicking out of her heels on the way. Anthea was about to suggest the sofa as a better change of venue when her partner dropped to her knees and began sifting through her skirt, and she became dedicated to never moving again if it disguised her own wobbly legs. “I could take the dress off,” she offered, and was proud of how her voice didn't flutter.

“But then I wouldn't get to wrinkle it.” Sally gathered the skirt, crumpled it upwards over her hips, and gave her a triumphant grin as she slowly regained her feet. She looked like a goddess rising, and Anthea tasted panic at the realisation of how easily she could fall. She chased it away with the flavour of Sally’s mouth and neck while Sally tugged her underthings out of the way until she could stroke between Anthea’s legs, too-gentle and relentless.

Slowly, so as not to fumble, Anthea reached for the catch on Sally’s flowy trousers to reciprocate, and stilled when a hand circled her wrist. “Just this,” Sally admonished, guiding her hand back up her body. “This is enough, and it's all you get of me. You’d have to impress me.”

Anthea heard the echo of her earlier words and set her jaw, set her teeth softly against the collarbone she’d admired earlier. Satisfaction curled in her belly at the throaty gasp she felt as much as heard. She had been challenged, and she would do her level best. While she was at it, though, she may as well get what she came for. She rocked into the other woman's palm, and demanded, “Harder.”

“Not just yet. First,” Sally slid the tip of a finger into her entrance, and Anthea worked herself on it so eagerly that Sally giggled and gave her more of everything.

Somewhere outside of the door, a quartet played swing and light jazz, not too well, but well enough for government work. People paired off to dance, deal, or argue. Someone was having their heart broken over a love affair or a rejected bit of legislation. Someone was keeping secrets or speaking out of turn. Anthea knew that the setting made this a worse idea than it already was, but if anything, her awareness of the mad timing and the steely edge of risk only drove her on. Because in _this_ room, there was the rustle of fabric and breathless whispers and slick, wet sounds and the sweet scent of the skin beneath Sally’s breasts.

When Sally came, she seemed surprised. She curled in on herself like she was warding off a blow and shuddered, eyes wide, her fingers losing their rhythm between Anthea’s thighs and her other hand grasping, nails digging into the meat of Anthea’s shoulder where she was bracing. The instant she regained herself, she set Anthea off like there was a trick to it and she’d known how all along.

Perhaps she had.

Sally was back to avoiding her eyes before they had their clothes in place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oleander is a warning sign in the flower language. It's also toxic. Don't put in in your mouth.


	3. Cars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not that it mattered much now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is about 11 months post-TRF. Mental health issues herein, mention of parasuicidal behavior. Take care, y'all.
> 
> We drive  
> To leave the past and clear the mind  
> to watch the sunset set its time  
> I swear you'll find  
> I'm your ride home  
> "She's My Ride Home"- Blue October

It wasn’t raining. Sally really wished that it was. It would have completed the whole miserable day. She’d begun avoiding calendars so she wouldn’t have to see the full count of awful numbered squares in their tidy regimented rows. Nearly a year gone.

She’d got the call at the end of a grueling day of combing of old case files, picking through facts and guesses and deductions and coming down to the same conclusion as they had on every other occasion: Sherlock Holmes had been a caustic prick, an irritating busybody, and an all-around disappointment of a human being, but the one thing she couldn’t pin him with was _criminal mastermind_.

Not that it mattered much now.

She had known who it was as soon as her mobile had rung. She had selected “No Rain” as Victor’s ringtone because it had reminded her of her kid brother back when polyphonic ringtones were a hot new feature of mobile phones and options were limited. In those days, the lyrics had been absent from the jangling melody. By the time she upgraded, the ringtones were mp3 clips, the comparison less favourable with the words included, and she’d learned to dread the song as it signaled that Victor was having difficulties. He certainly wouldn’t be ringing her otherwise.

Her phone conversations with Victor that fateful year had been full of the observations of an affable young man in his first year of graduate-level work, before he was introduced to Sherlock. He’d taken his new mate home for the Christmas hols and her mum had been so pleased with Sherlock that she’d put him on the phone to mumble hello with the voice of someone who didn’t know why he was being called on in class and didn’t have the answer. Sally had been sort-of charmed and a little hopeful: Victor had always been good at fitting in, but on shakier ground with close friendships. _This will be good for him_ , she had thought, _maybe good for both of them_.

More and more Victor had talked about his new friend, then stopped talking about him, then stopped talking about anything. She’d been run off her feet at work, trying to prove herself in a field that wasn't the most welcoming. She’d spared a moment every day to assure herself that things were fine with Victor. _I’ll ring him at lunch, after work, before bed_ , she’d think, and never quite get to it. When she slept, her dreams were full of forms in triplicate and running and a faint thread of worry.

The first time Victor had been hauled in, the interrogation room had seemed more familiar than her brother, wild eyes and sullen mouth startling in his usually open face. They’d set the bail high- he’d been holding more than a body could use alone- and he’d followed all of the rules for as long as he needed to and no trouble since. Sally was no kind of fool. There was going straight, and there was being careful and not getting caught. All she could say about her brother was that he was too headstrong to take the former and too clever not to have managed the latter.

That’d been the night she had properly met Vic’s bad influence, in the form of a half-stoned swot with too much to say.

Her career had taken a ding that might have been worse if they’d shared both parents and a last name. As it was, Greg Lestrade had been the only one who knew everything and still looked at her steady and head-on. In ways she’d never say, that made up for him letting Sherlock in on investigations. Almost. She couldn’t explain all the misgivings she had to her senior, and she didn’t think she needed to. As much as it pained her, Sherlock was a resource. It was like keeping a snake as a pet in case you needed antivenom.

The difference was that snakes were immune to themselves. Which brought her back to present, to the stack of cases that Sherlock hadn’t orchestrated after all, to her dawning horror that she’d listened to the wrong serpent at the Yard and done exactly as she was meant to. The notion that she’d been a good little puppet made her lips screw up in disgust. Worse than all, though, was how it had brought her here.

Victor had been clean for years, and if he was still selling now and again, she couldn’t prove it beyond a feeling. He’d even got promoted to shift leader, though he was still smarting from the fact that his degree in early childhood education was nearly impossible to use with his record.

Then he’d seen the news. Sherlock had jumped, and Vic had spiralled, slow, inexorable. Sally had seen the signs this time and still not known what she could say when so much of this new tide of trauma had come from her. At least he didn’t seem to be using. He just wasn’t doing much else, either.

She’d gone when he called, and found him surrounded by teacups in various stages of yuck He was awfully skinny, curled up on his loveseat so small that there was space for someone to sit beside him. She had taken the spot, though she didn’t think it was for her. After a moment, he’d slurred, “I don’ feel good.”

He’d sounded so much like he had as a child that she’d almost corrected him- ‘don’t feel _well_ ’- but she’d clocked that he was telling her what was truer, anyway. They were both right, and she was too weary to discuss semantics with him.

She cleaned him up and took him to a clinic, the clinic sent him to A&E, and the A&E wanted to discuss temporary sectioning. The doctor there rattled off some numbers regarding his electrolytes and his blood pressure, brought up his lack of self-care, then caught the flat look Sally was giving her and sighed. “With Victor’s history, Miss Trevor-”

“Donovan,” Sally snapped automatically, then winced and waved the word away. There was a use to being punchy; it was keeping her on her feet, but this was the wrong battle.

The doctor had told Sally her name at some point. Sally couldn’t recall it. All she took away from the conversation was the phrase _suicidal ideation_.

In the end, Victor signed his own papers. It was the wisest thing she’d seen him do in months.

As she scuffled out of the side door of the hospital, she noticed the security camera on the corner of the building across the way. Ordinarily, when she noticed these sentinels, these mechanical minions of Mycroft Holmes, she would show them a finger or two. Tonight- or was it morning soon enough?- she was too strung-out to do more than give a noncommittal shrug. She sat down on the bench, and wished for rain.

*           *           *

Anthea had come in late for this story, but she had the benefit of Mycroft’s confidence won from too many evenings fielding his directives, looking after his work while he and his helpmate had looked after his brother. She’d been asked, some years back, to maintain uncomfortable pressure on dealers in the area with special attention to two individual buyers. She had done. She knew the name.

Moreover, she was able to pick up on quite a lot of Mycroft’s inner speculation without him having to say a word, so she knew who Victor Trevor had been to Sherlock, and who Sherlock had wanted him to be.

So when Sally arrived with her younger half-brother at a local A&E, Trevor’s name was flagged and his records hit her inbox within moments of being saved. Anthea put a car on standby. Just in case. When Trevor was admitted she gathered her things. When she saw Sally fail to flip the camera off, she mobilized and headed towards St. Charles Hospital.

She hadn’t thought she’d actually be needed. As she pulled up and rolled down the window in front of Sally’s perch, she still wasn’t sure. Until Sally looked up. Anthea had seen that hollow-eyed stare on Mycroft’s face when her charge’s brother had got in too deep. She opened the door and offered, and Sally wordlessly slid onto the back seat, like entering a pond without a splash. It felt wrong.

It was a few minutes before Sally did more than blink and breathe. The sideways twist of her mouth gave Anthea had the notion that her companion was sorting through piles of troubles and deciding what to put in the wash first. She sat paralysed. Whatever they had- and there _was_ something- she wasn’t sure if it was big enough to excuse sympathy. They’d been approaching this whole thing like it was a rivalry, and on one level, it was. Yet here was Sally Donovan in the back of her car in anguish, and Anthea’s stomach was in knots over wanting to soothe her. She wondered when she’d started rooting for the other side, and if it was mutual.

She reached, cautiously bold, across the space between them and stopped her movement at the point equidistant between them. She flicked her eyes over and saw Sally smiling slightly at her hand, _why? Oh._ The paint on one of her French-tips was badly chipped after a minor incident yesterday. It must please Sally no end to discover she had cracks in her varnish. Anthea held perfectly still, and waited without hope or expectation. Then she realised her mistake.

She turned her hand palm-up.

Sally took it.

It occurred to Anthea that this was the most innocent act, the most innocuous thing they’d done, and it still went deeper than anything before. Absurdly, the whole of her focus was tied down to Sally’s palm pressed to hers, her fingers gripping tightly a shade shy of squeezing. Sally's skin was dry and soft where it met hers, and she could detect the scent of hospital hand soap and desperation in the still air. She wanted to hold her breath out of respect, and she knew that made no sense at all.

Anthea could trace the trajectory of the younger Holmes’ fall, and understood she was seeing the shockwaves from the landing. She gave herself a few seconds to imagine passing along the information that Sherlock was alive, before she buried the impulse completely. Honestly, who knew if that were still true, at this moment? She wasn’t sure if that would really help Sally or her brother, and it surely would hurt them, one way or another.

They sat in intimate silence for minutes and miles, traffic spare at this hour. Presently the car pulled to a stop, and Anthea found herself scrabbling for something to say. If she expressed her condolences over Victor’s hardships, it would come off as condescending. If she said nothing at all, it would seem awkward and stiff. What was safe?

“It looks like it wants to rain,” she said. She groaned inwardly. Weather, really. Transparent.

Sally froze, hand on the door latch and looked at her searchingly. She blinked. “Yeah, I was thinking that too,” she said. “I hope it does.” She waited a beat. “Do you want to come up?” She asked, and her tone was the wrong sort of anxious.

Anthea studied her, took in the dull gaze and worry lines creased across her forehead. She knew Sally only wanted a distraction, a quick bit of comfort and any excuse to keep holding back tears for a for more hours. She wanted to say yes. “No,” she replied, “I shouldn't.”

They both startled at the distant roll of thunder, seeming too loud in the hushed pauses.

Anthea met her eyes again. She wanted to ask if Sally had someone to sit with her, someone who wouldn't take her to bed and let her forget her worry, someone who would listen. She gave her a soft smile instead, and Sally returned it a little wry, a little worse for the wear, and smaller.

Sally got out of the car. Anthea watched her go, and hoped it rained for her sake. She needed it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elements of this chapter were inspired by [this post](http://sallydonovan.tumblr.com/post/98812523174/shit-that-definitely-goes-down-at-scotland-yard), used with permission.


	4. Benches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was never meant to be like anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's hard to think about what you've wanted  
> It's hard to think about what you'd lost  
> This doesn't have to be the big get even  
> This doesn't have to be anything at all  
> "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around"-Stevie Nicks & Tom Petty

It was quite a while before the news of Sherlock’s continued existence was a source of relief and didn’t only call up the the feel of Anthea’s chipped nail paint under Sally’s fingers. No wonder the other woman hadn’t come inside. She’d only been there to ease the damage.

They were back in their holding pattern, drawn together by virtue of the same goals and repelled by their shared sense of personal superiority. For Sally, at least, the need to dominate the situation had slacked back to a half-hearted wish to meet on equal footing. She wasn’t sure if such a thing were possible. The fact was, Anthea was holding a few more cards than Sally had claim to. She found herself wondering, baffled, how Greg managed to keep up with Mycroft when he couldn’t even be sure how much pertinent information Holmes was swallowing around. She couldn’t quite reconcile the woman who had held her hand all the way to her flat and the one who could have told her that her brother was mourning a living man, that Sally hadn’t sent them both over the edge after all.

To be sure, she had no real reason to expect the truth from Anthea. They hadn't bumped into one another with any regularity before, and then they rarely even nodded to each other. There were just the scant few times they had- erm- _connected_ , and those seemed barely worth mentioning when stacked against the years of tense silence. And yet.

Those times loomed pretty large in her own mind, and that was part of the trouble, wasn't it? She was a damned fool, assigning meaning to events where there’d been none. Feelings didn't work retrospectively. And so what if she thought maybe she might have liked a bit more? It was never meant to be like that. It was never meant to be like anything.

So she let it ride. When she spotted Anthea across a room at some function or at a press meeting, she would wait until she could escape (plus an extra beat for the sake of dignity) and then get the hell out.

That might have been more or less the end of it, but. Well. Things had got a bit strange.

First, she’d sighted Anthea at the local pub on Friday, not a week after the anonymous tip that had helped them pin the Waters gang. She’d been tempted to spin on her heel, but half of her team was already knocking back drinks, and she had earned this. Anthea had seemed a bit nonplussed. Her dark eyes had followed Sally to the bar and then the table, but she had left after a few minutes with a respectful nod and a thoughtful press to her mouth. Sally had almost believed it was accidental.

Then, early of a morning four months later, she’d walked into her favourite coffee shop. Sally stuttered just slightly while ordering an extra shot of espresso when she realised who was in the corner booth looking for all the world like she was memorising Sally’s order without looking up from her mobile. She’d left with her cup and her bagel instead of taking a seat as she otherwise would have.

It happened again when she stopped into the Boots on her way home the following winter. She’d bolted that time. She suddenly didn’t need lip balm as badly as she’d thought.

It wasn't until March that she caught on. She went to pick up takeaway for herself and Victor and saw Anthea tracking her movements from the rain-lashed window of a restaurant across the road. Her gaze seemed to be on Sally’s shoes, marking her steps as she swiftly climbed back into the cab with the warm scent of naan and coriander hitting the back of her tongue. The reason she and Anthea couldn't manage to avoid one another lately was that Sally was the only one trying to.

Sally got better at dodging after that. She already knew how to case a room at a glance, and from a distance. What stuck in her teeth was that Anthea hadn’t tried to bother her. She didn’t know what to make of that.

* * *

Anthea didn’t know what to make of this.

It wasn’t as though she didn’t know what she was feeling. She had managed to carve time for intimate relationships through years of school and careful grooming, and found them occasionally well-worth the struggle. Likewise, she felt only residual angst over her preferences. She had warred too hard with the world at large to fight with herself anymore. So when she’d seen Sally and _wanted_ , it hadn’t been a surprise so much as an inconvenience. They had to work together, for God’s sake, she couldn’t afford to get tangled up in the hair and lips and hips of a colleague. It wasn’t on.

Nor was she dense enough to not realise that any hope she might have had of shifting this whole endeavor slightly to the left and out of adversarial territory had been stomped flat by her refusal to break trust and breach national security. That whole mess with Sherlock had done a number on a fair few hearts. Anthea understood, knew that some jobs were better left to ghosts, but her unease with her charge’s little brother was a bit wider in scope and farther back in time. She doubted he would ever fully comprehend what he’d put them all through for so long.

Still, she had hopes. At the very least, she felt a pull towards Sally and a need to clear the air. She had no idea why. Who was to say that this wasn't another misstep in the making? Would Sally benefit from Anthea’s explanations or was her motivation a selfish one, reaching for absolution when she didn't believe she’d done anything wrong.

Perhaps there were one or two things she hadn't done precisely right, but wondering what to say was getting her nowhere except across countless rooms from someone she badly wanted to speak to. Maybe if she said the right thing, it might evolve into speaking _with_ , and even strained communication would be a far cry better than what they had now.

The thing was, lying in wait wasn’t working. Watching Sally saunter in knocked the breath from her lungs every time. The notion of the reverse, of cornering her where she’d already dug in, was both daunting and seemed likely to push an escalation. This hesitation had stayed her hand thus far. The last thing Anthea wanted was to incite a confrontation with a spitfire in an enclosed space. Sally already took up all the oxygen in a given area without her closing the vent and fanning the flames.

She got her chance in June. Sally ducked under the striped awning of a food truck to grab a gyro and Anthea waited until she was settled on the edge of a bench along the border for St. James’ Park before making her move.

Anthea watched Sally suck olive oil off the pad of a finger and grin to herself, feral, perched half-sideways on the edge of the seat and ready to spring back into action even in repose. Icy doubt crept into her ears again, bridged the spaces between her ribs and reminded her that this meant very little- that _she_ meant very little, indeed- to this woman. What the hell was she going to say when _I'm sorry_ wasn’t true?

At last, she sat down on the lee side of Sally’s angled body, in her shadow. She felt her mouth twitch in faint dissatisfaction. The symbolism irked her a tiny measure. Sally knew she was there, she saw the blurry slouched line of her spine draw itself into focus as she stiffened, then she slowly relaxed again.

Gathering her words was like trying to pick up too many pebbles. When she opened her mouth, she was startled to hear Sally’s voice instead, low and tense so tired underneath, “Look, I get it, right?”

Anthea blinked. This might be easier that she had predicted.

“You did your job,” Sally snorted, “I just didn’t realise it was me.”

Oh, contradictions she could do. And she really should. “No.” Well, it was a decisive start. Sally turned her head a little, looked at her in profile, and Anthea elaborated: “I didn’t give you a ride, or,” she swallowed, “anything else- because of Sherlock or any other Holmes. My interest in you is personal.”

“Really.” Sally dropped the word like a stumbling block. Anthea stepped lightly.

“Let me make it up to you,” she offered.

Sally spun to face her properly, squinted her eyes and studied Anthea, unblinking and quietly emphatic, “No.”

Anthea caught the crest of hurt in her voice, and nodded. All right, then. All right. She would pull her nets back in empty, and rend them. It was done. It was fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This follows the year after Sherlock gets back and then some months post-HLV/TAB, so we're about at chapter 12 of _Happiness Shared_ , if you're trying to keep track, you poor poor darlings.


	5. Windows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sally feared that she might have messed up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I was wrong  
> I think you were right  
> All my angry words  
> Keep me up at night  
> "The Difficult Kind"-Sheryl Crow

“I, uh.” Victor paused so long that Sally stopped what she was doing and lifted her head to look at her brother, silhouetted in the kitchen window as he unpacked their groceries. If she prodded Victor, he was likely to leave off entirely. It was better to change the subject and let him drop his guard while he worked through what he wanted to say.

“The pears go in the crisper, I can’t reach them up there,” she said.

Victor glanced at her and continued to place them on the top shelf. “That’s rather the point. I like pears too, you know. Think this time, you could spare me one?”

“I’ll consider it, but you’ll have to be nice to me.”

“Never mind, then,” he laughed, and pushed the bag of fruit to the back of the cabinet, reaching and up on his toes. She remembered fondly when she’d had the literal upper hand in height. He’d outstripped her in their teens, and teased her ever since.

He was still smiling when he spoke next, but it was a sparkle like fool’s gold, too bright to be true. “I went to see Sherlock today,” he said.

She felt a fist in her gut. “Sherlock.”

“Holmes,” he added unnecessarily, a sardonic little smirk digging into one cheek.

“Why.” Her struggle to keep her voice even made her question sound less like a query and more like the demand it really was. What on earth could be gained from the two of them in the same room?

“He’s getting married after the new year, and,” Vic caught the end of his tongue between his teeth for a beat, and she held her breath, “because I loved him once.”

Sally had wondered about that, but only afterwards, once she’d seen the damage. She’d been waiting for her brother to say it for over a decade, but she supposed he had been waiting even longer.

Still, she felt like she was missing a step here. “And?” She winced; that had come out a little harsh even to her own ears, but she was thrown and she didn’t enjoy that feeling.

Victor’s voice lost the gloss, and dropped to a mumble she remembered from the group therapy sessions she had sat in on. He sounded like he was trying to hide his consonants behind his back while he coaxed his emotions out of their den. “And… And I never said. Not even when we were alone, and certainly not when others might hear. And I think I should have. He might have let me keep him, if I’d told him I wanted him to. If I hadn’t been so afraid.”

She thought of Anthea, then realised what it meant that Anthea’s smile against her neck and a rumpled blue dress and a car when it wasn’t raining anywhere but inside her own head came to mind so easily. Sally feared that she might have messed up.

She prompted, “How did that go?” with half of her attention on a mental slideshow of all the things she hadn’t noticed and all the moments she could have shifted the tone to reflect something less combative and more honest.

“He… it was nice. John’s pretty intense.” Sally snorted. She could almost see the doctor standing guard, his jealousy and vigilance sharpened to a stiletto point. “It was good to see him again. It feels- I don’t know- like there was a stone in my shoe and now it’s gone. We hurt each other, and we’ve said sorry. Maybe we’ll never be friends again, but,” Vic was fidgeting, his back still mostly turned. “People say ‘closure’ like it’s an ending. It feels like a start.”

That evening, Sally rode a chilly wind all the way to Pall Mall. She’d started her afternoon believing that a proper sergeant ought to be capable of finding a phone number without assistance. Forty minutes and two databases later, she’d come down to the thought that actually, a proper sergeant used every tool in the box, whatever the cost to pride. She'd made two phone calls and sent a text, and received instructions via intermediary in the form of the elder Holmes brother. Mycroft had been vague and succinct, and made it look easy to be both. He managed to give the impression that he was actively engaged in four other conversations without being rude about the fact that he had priorities beyond her bid to contact his handler. She supposed she should feel grateful, and she poked at her Holmes-shaped bruise. Maybe later there would be time for grace. Right now, she was too busy learning to bend.

When she looked up from the sidewalk outside the Diogenes Club, she spotted Anthea in a window, half-lit in watery streaks of fading sunlight. For a moment she simply watched. This was the nearest she'd been to Anthea in months, and she paused on the shore line, unwilling to disturb the water by drawing attention. Not that she could escape notice long. Their eyes met and held for a moment before Anthea blinked and stepped back from the glass and out of sight. She’d looked surprised. Sally went inside, followed instructions and a server down the silent hall to do what scared her. It seemed like the best thing to do, if one conflated goodness with bravery, and Sally always had.

*          *          *

Anthea had been waiting to meet Mycroft, who had claimed to want her opinion on something. Upon seeing Sally on the path below looking like she was expected, Anthea smelled a setup and pulled her phone out.

“You said it was important,” she hissed when he answered without a hesitation or a greeting.

“I said it might be,” Mycroft replied in the airy tone that meant he was trying to cover his arse. “You’ve been pining. I’ve seen enough mirrors to recognise the look.” She pressed her lips into a thin line and was sure he could hear it in her silence. He continued, “She was desperate to speak with you. I chose an advantageous field on your behalf, and you still have a moment to flee, but no time to agonise.” He rang off without another word.

Damn him.

Anthea thought of ducking out. She thought of going back to her flat. She thought of cold nights and colder mornings, hands wrapped around her mug to feel something warm. She thought of her parents, out of love and still together. “Where else would I go?” her dad had scoffed, long years ago when Anthea had asked if he was leaving. He’d tossed out some mutterings on how no one else put the right amount of onion in the tuna salad, but she heard comfort in his meaning. Where else, indeed?

When the knock came, she answered it, her spine straight and her chin up.

Sally was ushered in and found her eyes immediately, like Anthea was a target. She looked as nervous as Anthea felt. She bit her lips until the door closed between them and the rest of the club, then blew out all in one breath, “I’m not saying you _can_ make it up to me, but do you still want to try?”

“Yes!” Anthea exclaimed, before remembering to check her enthusiasm. Actually, no. Fuck that, quite honestly. “Yes please,” she said, relief making her a little more sedate, but no less ardent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter might be very short, as it was never supposed to happen. Actually, this whole thing was originally 3 chapters, maybe 4 tops. I blame the AD chatroom.


	6. Beds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The scope of her demands were grasped now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woman, open the door, don't let it sting  
> I wanna breathe that fire again  
> "Read My Mind"-The Killers

Anthea had insisted that Sally name her terms, but had wrinkled her brow a little at the response. “You want to fix me dinner?”

Sally had nodded, solemn, because she knew that she was asking for a bigger concession than Anthea could see from her angle yet- ah. There it was. Anthea had peered at her and gave her a smile that Sally could feel in her belly. The scope of her demands were grasped now. _No_ , she thought. _I want the home advantage. I want you on my pitch. I want you in my bed. I want you. I want._

She had gone home and had to do very little pleading to get Victor to agree to make himself scarce on the evening in question. She’d barely strung words together before he grinned knowingly and said, “It’s fine. Some of the people from group were talking about billiards and bowling on Friday night, and I bet Harry’ll let me kip on her couch.”

It would have been much easier to invite herself to Anthea’s flat. It was surely well-furnished, tastefully decorated, and private, not cluttered up and shared. But seeing the other woman’s natural habitat wouldn’t have told her much she hadn’t already gathered. More, it would have lost Sally nothing much, and she found that she wanted it to cost her. She felt like it should cost something, should hurt a little, this beginning. Sally wasn’t sure whose turn it was to reach out first, but she was resolved to stop puzzling over it. That line of thinking hadn’t done her much good so far. Considering the impulse that had sparked their first kiss, thinking of any sort might best be left out of it.

Work ran late on Thursday, and she’d fallen asleep after barely tasting her dinner. She spent all day Friday chewing the inside of her cheek as she remembered the mess in the bath, the dishes in the sink, and the general confusion of the refrigerator. And nevermind that she couldn't actually cook. Shit.

So when she pushed through the doorway into a clean flat with cozy lighting, and found a recipe stuck to the fridge with her sparrow magnets and the chief ingredients inside it, she sent up all blessings on her little brother. Victor had left a couple of notes in the blank margins, right where she would have had questions. Should be easy enough, really.

Still, she was more dismayed than surprised when she smelled the smoke a second before she heard the buzzer. She made a line for the button before she even considered going to the oven first. Fire could wait for her.

*          *          *

Anthea was buzzed up and found the door being thrown open as she reached it a minute later. Sally managed to wince while wide-eyed, saying, “Dinner’s a tad crunchier than I expected,” and still holding an oven mitt.

“ _Al denté_?” Anthea ventured.

“Uh, _en flambé_ , more like,” Sally answered. Then she giggled, a warm sound like a flame in a stove pipe. Anthea wanted to curl up in front of that laughter and dry off, dry out, spark, catch, and disappear into it.

She didn't give Sally a kiss so much as she let her take one, leaning in and finding Sally’s arms suddenly around her like they belonged there, and they did. She kindled quick, losing track of her fingers but keeping them light, brushing over soft clothes before those parted and fell and gave way to softer skin. Her lips were against Sally’s temple and she could smell smoke in her hair and it was so perfectly suited that it took her a few more kisses to realise that the scent was not actually Sally, and hot breath and the scrape of teeth against her bared nipple to change her mind back.

Sally stopped, straightened, and said, “Dinner…”

“Later. Bed?”

Sally exhaled a grin, twined their fingers and led her down the hall, shedding what remained of their fetters. Anthea hadn’t counted on there being so many pillows and cushions on the bed, couldn't imagine Sally’s neck bent enough for that. To her amazement, the thought actually made it to sound without checking itself in the back of her throat.

Sally laughed again, offered to show her just how far she could bend.

“Yes,” Anthea whispered. “Show me everything. I’d love to see.” _I’d love. I do._

The mood shifted. Maybe Sally had heard her unuttered declaration, or had her own to think of, but everything was brought into focus in the dusky light. What had been antagonistic had evolved. They had gone straight from enemies to lovers without even bothering to hit the points in between and had to double back for understanding. Now she was almost too shy to touch Sally on equal terms. If they weren’t fighting, how did this go? How much was she allowed to feel?

She wasn’t sure she could control that anyway, and when she met Sally’s eyes, she knew she didn’t have to try. She had never seen Sally completely nude, and it struck her as especially important in this hour where everything was meaningful. She skimmed the back of her fingers across Sally’s cheek, and she watched the progression of her hand down the silky swell of her breast, along the slope of her ribs, trailing shivers in her wake. Despite the lightness of her caress, Anthea felt the weight of potential. They were adjusting to the shape of things as they stood, groping to find the edges of the even field.

When she raised her eyes, she had the sense that Sally’s gaze had never left her face. They traded smiles, then pressed them together, kissing carefully. They moved together with caution, having spied the dangers and pitfalls here and determined to avoid them going forward. Sally’s touch was firm on her shoulder, snug around her back, and Anthea burned to feel it in other places.

They ended up on their sides on the bed, swimming in opposite directions on a sea blue duvet, Sally sucking bruises into the tender thin skin over her hipbones while Anthea laid soft open-mouthed kisses down her belly and mound before using her tongue to spread Sally’s legs, letting her do the same a moment later.

She forgot to breathe, misplaced her sense of finesse and time, and dedicated herself to causing as much pleasure as she could for as long as she had. Her head lay pillowed on the inside of Sally’s thigh and she dragged her nails lightly over the glimpsed curve of arse and beyond, as far as she could reach and gently back.

Sally squeezed and pinched and nipped and Anthea held herself still while she worked her lips and tongue and a suggestion of teeth over and between and inside and _oh_. She remembered, all at once, that there was a point to this game, a light in a window not far off, and she sped up her own pace.

The grind of Sally’s hips grew erratic. She juttered and froze, digging her fingertips into the sway of Anthea’s back, and sucked hard as she moaned, and that was plenty to bring Anthea along.

Sally barely let a moment pass for rest before she was sitting up and pulling Anthea up to kiss her again, their flavours mingling in their mouths. Their eyes locked together when they pulled back, panting lightly as the sweat cooled. It felt like a pact. It tasted like a promise.

They shuffled under the covers, content to doze for the time being in each other’s company and put dinner off a little longer. “I know a place on the next street that will deliver if I wheedle and tip. I don’t mind doing either. ‘Sides,” Sally joked, “you’ll stay if I feed you, yeah?”

“Breakfast is on me, then,” Anthea agreed, stifling a satisfied yawn and stretching out, her foot sliding along Sally’s calf in the twist of blankets. “Anything you like.”

“I like you,” came the other woman’s admission, half-buried in a cheeky tone and the pillowcase.

“Well, doable.”

“Yeah.” Sally pressed a kiss into her hair. “Exactly.”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are appreciated!


End file.
